week 38: (15/12/2015) Cladding to the front and the beginnings of a kitchen...

Ash has been outside again working on the terrace to be. This week building the beginnings of the long step/bench that runs along the front wall of the terrace. Great to see this finally progressing. The top of the terrace is giving us real concern as its beam and block, its mile from flat (out by about 50mm between various points), it has a lot of movement (spring) and there is no depth for a proper screed on top of it. Major mess up. Major headache to sort. 

The guys have been back out on the scaffolding adding the cedar cladding to the top and the sides of the balcony. Great to see this finally happening - feels like its been forever.

They can't do the bottom yet until the glass arrives and is in place as the glass that makes the balustrade on the balcony will be covered by the bottom bottom part of the picture frame cedar.

Ash, a man of many talents, has also been hard at it installing a slate doorstep that really works well with the RAL 7016 door colour. It also has had the benefit of firming up the door frame somewhat, previously it felt like part of the set of Neighbours!

Meanwhile Mark has been inside beginning to fit the kitchen. We missed out slot with the kitchen fitter because of running behind and couldn't reschedule till the new year. As a result we ended up with Mark fitting the kitchen. He does not seem to be enjoying it. He is a joiner/cabinet maker and used to doing fine work (like the stairs) working with real wood, as opposed to man made boards etc and the German instructions are very limited. To his credit he is really putting n the hours to try and help us get in by Christmas.

Meanwhile I have been lending a hand fitting the utility room. This has proved a bit annoying as various dimensions have not turned out as planned and a number of units have had to be manually adjusted in witdth/length, not fun routing chipboard in a cold garage at nearly midnight by torchlight. Its been a busy week but we have a huge amount to do next week to get in for Christmas. It goes without saying that at this stage I am working all hours to help out where ever I can but crucially Micheal's team are really getting behind it and doing a great job.